[1][2][3] On 1 July 2007, 61-year-old Goh Chin Hock, a SBS Transit bus driver, was waiting at a bus-stop in front of a HDB block along Stirling Road, Queenstown, when he heard a loud "thud" sound and turned around, witnessing the body of a young woman lying dead at the void deck of that same HDB block.
Dr Gilbert Lau, the forensic pathologist who examined the victim's body, found that Smaelmeeral died as a result of multiple injuries (including skull fractures) caused by a fall.
A broken tooth was also found at the bus stop in front of the HDB block where Smaelmeeral fell to her death, where the police deduced could be the original crime scene.
[7][8] Two bus drivers also told police that they saw a man walking away from the crime scene after he reached the ground floor and looked at the body.
[5] During the trial, the court was told that after the birth of their daughter, the couple's marriage began to deteriorate, and they also frequently argued with one another, and Tharema also abused his wife regularly.
[23][24][25] Tharema also did not maintain a stable job, and hence Smaelmeeral had to work night shifts to supplement the family income.
Due to her husband's abuse, Smaelmeeral gradually became alcoholic and she was also hospitalized in the Institute of Mental Health at one point.
[26] According to Tharema, he blamed his wife's sister Hametah for causing their marriage to worsen and break down, because he suspected that his sister-in-law and her other family members had placed some black magic onto him and his wife, causing Smaelmeeral and himself to argue frequently and their relationship to deteriorate until it became irreparable, and he had also invited several bomohs on a few occasions in an attempt to dissipate the purported black magic.
[5] Tharema also claimed that the police investigator had led him along and coerced him into admitting to killing his ex-wife, which he did not remember committing but he surrendered out of consideration for his children and friends.
[39] Subsequently, Dr Tommy Tan, a private consultant psychiatrist, testified that Tharema was suffering from a delusional disorder that caused him to erroneously believe that he was cursed by black magic, and he acted on his delusional beliefs, and hence it had a substantial impairment of his mental responsibility at the time of the murder, and his huge intake of alcohol prior to the murder also caused his mental state to be influenced by the effects of acute alcohol intoxication.
However, Dr Kenneth Koh, the prosecution's psychiatric expert, testified that the intake of alcohol was insufficient for Tharema be intoxicated and not having a clear consciousness of his actions.
[5][44] Tharema was reportedly calm when the death sentence was pronounced in court, but his family members and friends were distraught at the verdict.
The appellate court also cited in their oral grounds of decision that in contrast to defence lawyer Wendell Wong's argument, Smaelmeeral could not have chosen to kill herself after Tharema's assault on her since her injuries were serious and she could not have alone got up to the 13th floor and climbed over the 1.2m parapet before her fall to death.